iPhone 5S’ One More Thing Feature: Motion Tracking Technology

Hallmark of Apple’s late co-founder Steve Jobs’ keynote presentations is his hidden one more thing reveal that adds to the appeal of Apple’s products. This year, that one more thing could be motion tracking technology after the fact that the new fingerprint scanner is now a widely anticipated feature that’s been thoroughly leaked and hyped.

Apple’s next generation iPhone 5S flagship could come with a significant speed boost and a new feature that tracks motion, according to Fox News‘ Clayton Morris, who claims that the A7 processor, designed by Apple based on architecture from ARM Holdings, would offer up to 31 percent faster speeds. Additionally, Morris says that motion tracking would utilize a separate processor on top of the A7 CPU.

While it’s been rumored that the A7 CPU would deliver faster speeds to Apple’s iOS 7 operating system that will debut alongside the flagship smartphone, Morris’ figures seem to be bullish. Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo had previously reported that the architecture would be responsible for about a 20 percent increase in efficiency, and also postulated that Apple could deliver 64-bit support on the latest iPhone hardware.

It’s unclear what benchmarking metrics Morris’ source(s) used to arrive at his 31 percent estimate.

The motion tracking utility would be new for the iPhone 5S. This information comes on top of the much anticipated fingerprint scanner that’s been rumored for the smartphone. It’s also unclear how motion tracking would be used on the iPhone.

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In a separate tweet, the Fox reporter wrote, “I’ve also heard there’s a separate chip devoted to motion tracking. Should be an interesting camera upgrade.”

Rivals like Samsung have been using the camera to track motion to add to the user experience, and it’s unclear if Apple will be implementing similar features. Samsung uses the camera to track eye motion so users can scrolls through a long webpage with the movement of their eyes. The camera can also track your eyes to not dim your display when you’re actively using the phone and can shut off the display when you’re not looking at the screen to conserve battery life. Similarly, videos could be stopped automatically when you look away.

Samsung also has an infrared sensor on the front display as well to track hand motion as well, a new feature that was introduced on the Galaxy S4 flagship earlier this year.

According to Apple Insider, Apple had already filed a number of patents for gaze detection that ties to the camera, so likely these features would be offloaded to the separate motion tracking processor to not only lighten the load on the main CPU, but also to conserve battery life. This is similar to Motorola’s implementation of the dual-core X8 processor on the Moto X with a low-powered CPU for handling the always-on voice commands.

The iPhone 5S is likely to be introduced alongside a more budget iPhone 5C at a special Apple media event that’s believed to be taking place on September 10. Until Apple announces the iPhone and its features, it’s unclear how accurate Morris’ report is.

Morris is confident about his intelligence, however, refuting allegations that these rumors could be take. On Twitter, the reporter told nay-sayers, “Well I’ve been dead on before and I trust my sources. So “fake” not likely.”

Tech enthusiast in Silicon Valley enjoying the possibilities of ubiquitous connectivity, information sharing, and collaboration enabled by mobile broadband. You can contact Chuong on Twitter @chuongvision or search +chuongvision on Google+.